


Glitch in the System: Clear as Mud

by SystemGlitch



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, F/F, Misunderstandings, sassy gabe friend
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-12
Updated: 2017-09-12
Packaged: 2018-12-29 02:48:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12073014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SystemGlitch/pseuds/SystemGlitch
Summary: By K.Widowmaker drags Sombra into some not-so-light gardening.A misunderstanding happens.





	Glitch in the System: Clear as Mud

Sunlight filtered through the cypress-laden garden, cutting thin, luminous swathes among their untamed branches. When Talon arrived a month ago, the garden was as much an art installation as it was a respite from the bustling world within and beyond the outpost walls: a meticulously curated selection of local flora contained within the boundaries dictated by remarkable columns of deep, resplendent green. Now, weeks later, the atrium better reflected its constituency, its shrubs and the tall, thin trees comprising its borders reflecting the chaotic aims of its lackluster curators.

Thankfully, it wasn’t quite a foregone cause. A day’s pruning and weeding would, by Widowmaker’s estimate, bring the garden back to at least a semblance of its former glory; from there, it would require only a few hours of care a week to maintain. An undertaking at the outset, certainly, but one which would prevent the recurrence of such aesthetic disrepair.

“Did you call it ‘aesthetic disrepair’?” Sombra asked as they leaned side by side against the railing of the balcony overlooking the atrium.

“Just help me,” Widowmaker replied. “I’m tired of looking at this mess and no one else is going to do it.”

“I don’t know shit about gardening.”

“We’re not gardening,” the taller woman clarified, relying fruitlessly on the semantic difference. “We’re just trimming.”

Sombra cast an appraising glance over the courtyard, a frown tugging at the corners of her mouth as she took stock of the haggard landscaping below. “How do you know what to trim and what to leave?”

Widowmaker shrugged. “I don’t.”

“So…,” Sombra prodded expectantly.

“So, cut what looks messy and pull what looks like it doesn’t belong,” the taller woman said as she stepped away from the railing. “We can’t make it any worse than it already is.”

“You’d be surprised,” Sombra replied, following her down the graduating staircase to the garden path below. “I could kill a cactus if you gave me the chance.”

Widowmaker laughed beneath her breath, light and quiet from a few feet ahead of her as they approached a shed tucked into the corner of the courtyard, its door hanging loosely in its frame. It gave way with a groan as she splayed a hand over its surface, its rust-eaten hinges offering no resistance as she pressed forward. Beyond lay a long workbench and a spartan collection of hardware and gardening tools hung haphazardly along the walls. Running her fingers along the line of assorted implements, she plucked a pair of pruning shears from the wall, handing them to Sombra before snagging a second, smaller pair for herself.

“The  _hell_  do we do with these?” she asked, opening and closing them with a degree of trepidation better suited to live wires or corrosives.

“You trim,” Widowmaker replied, tossing her a pair of heavy polyurethane gloves. “Go on,” she commanded, shooing the hacker from the shed. She followed shortly after, tugging on her own gloves as she trailed the shorter woman.

“Where do I start?” Sombra asked as she glanced from plot to plot.

“Wherever you please,” Widowmaker replied as she started on the first in a long row of cypress trees.

Hours passed, the pair combing across the garden one tree, shrub, and flower bed at a time. Widowmaker took to the task with tenacity in lieu of skill, approaching each unhewn branch with meticulous attention to detail. Her work was far from perfect, but it was still a dramatic improvement over the garden’s prior state of neglect. That, for the time being, was sufficient.

Sombra, on the other hand, proceeded with increasing frustration. Though her work was no better nor worse than her partner’s, Widowmaker seemed content with the work getting done at all, while Sombra only saw a growing series of amateur imperfections.

“This is bullshit,” Sombra grumbled as she tried and failed a fourth time to even the edges of a particularly officious shrub. Widowmaker, perched atop a ladder where she was engaged in a battle of wits with the almost-perfect point of one treetop, paid her complaint - one of many - no mind.

Sombra knelt, gathering a handful of branch trimmings and lobbing them upwards. The wad of wood, leaves, and dirt connected squarely with the back of the sniper’s head before dissolving into its composite parts.

“ _Aïe_!” she yelped, dropping her shears to steady herself against the ladder. “Really, Sombra?”

“I said,  _this is bullshit_ ,” the shorter woman repeated, crossing her arms.

“Then take a break.” Widowmaker replied coolly. Sombra’s tantrum began hardly an hour into their task and Widowmaker had long tired of reminding her they weren’t striving for anything beyond simple maintenance. As the hacker’s mood worsened, the sniper gave up on her plaintive and admittedly clumsy attempts at encouragement, choosing instead to concentrate exclusively on her work. This only seemed to make Sombra even  _more_  upset, and Widowmaker resigned herself to having to weather her attitude until she either gave up or quit.

“Maybe I will,” Sombra grunted, turning on her heel and marching back up the stairs toward the estate, leaving a quietly flabbergasted Widowmaker to her work.

* * *

Dusk settled over the garden as she finished, tugging her gloves off one finger at a time before tossing them without so much as a backwards glance into the shed behind her. It wasn’t a professional gardening job by any means, but it was certainly a marked improvement: the hedges were pruned and nearly even, the cypresses restored to their original, spiring formations. The flowerbeds presented a unique challenge inasmuch as her floral literacy was profoundly lacking, so Widowmaker resorted to keeping what was appealing and weeding anything that looked remotely like it didn’t belong. The result was more unbalanced than she preferred, with bald patches of empty soil dotting the landscape in unpredictable patterns; thankfully, it was less noticeable when considering the garden as a cohesive whole.

Hands on her hips, Widowmaker turned to face the staircase by which Sombra disappeared that afternoon. The hacker never returned, leaving her to continue in earnest. Though she welcomed the lack of interruption at first, a nagging twinge of guilt supplanted her relief as the day progressed, lingering now with the scent of soil and the heavy tiredness borne of a long day’s work.

Pursing her lips, she cast her gaze upwards to the westernmost corner of the outpost, leveling on the broad balcony window she knew to be Sombra’s. How was she  _supposed_  to react to the other woman’s whining? She knew Sombra better than to suspect she desired any coddling, so what, exactly, had she been looking for?

“ _Ça craint_ ,” she muttered under her breath, setting off toward the steps. She sure as Hell wasn’t going to get any answers from the garden.

* * *

Of course, finding Sombra required exponentially more legwork than Widowmaker anticipated. Mugs of cocoa in either hand, the sniper traversed the halls of the west wing to no success. The hacker’s room was not only unlocked, but empty aside from Toulouse, and she wasn’t camped out in the kitchen or any of the other communal areas.

Gabriel, churlish as ever, had watched the sniper as she scooped cinnamon into both mugs, his narrowed eyes and omnipresent frown lodged somewhere between intrigue, horror, and concern.

“Cocoa,” he observed with dry removal better suited to a death sentence.

“ _Oui_ , what of it?”

“Amélie Lacroix-,”

“Don’t call me that,” she snapped, diverting her attention precisely long enough to affix Reyes with a piercing, golden stare. Though he offered nothing in the way of apology, he raised his hands, palms out, in a gesture of retreat.

“Widowmaker, making cocoa.  _With cinnamon_.”

“Yes, Gabriel. It’s  _Novembre_ : a perfectly reasonable time for cocoa.”

“Who’s the other mug for?” he asked, raised eyebrows indicating he knew perfectly well its intended recipient.

“Certainly not you,” Widowmaker shot back. “Where’s Sombra?”

“Haven’t seen her,” Gabriel rasped, matching her dismissiveness effortlessly. “Try the roof.”

She thought he was joking. Now, having exhausted all other alternatives, the assassin rounded a series of corners to find the attic staircase hanging open, illuminated from above by the flickering orange glow of centuries-old electric lamplight.

Rolling her eyes, Widowmaker followed the stairs upward to a dust-smothered attic spanning at least half the wing. Its contents were few: old candelabrum, a smattering of wooden crates and sealed cardboard boxes, plastic-covered furniture, unframed paintings faded beyond recognition. Unlike the rest of the outpost, this quarter was reserved mostly for living space; thus, while Talon leveraged other parts of the building to their fullest extent, it barely used most of what this wing had to offer. If not for the lines of footprints trailing from the staircase to the rooftop exit at the other end of the room, it would be easy to mistake for untouched.

She followed them until she could see Sombra sitting just outside on the rooftop, a thick blanket wrapped around her shoulders.

“Is this where you take your petulance?” Widowmaker asked as she stepped through the narrow doorway. Sombra’s only reply was a shrug, almost unnoticeable through the swathe of heavy wool. “How did Gabriel know you’d be here?”

At this, Sombra laughed inwardly. “He comes here, too,” she replied, accepting the mug offered her. “ _Awkward_.”

“Mm, prime brooding real estate,” Widowmaker quipped as she sat beside the hacker.

“Cinnamon?” Sombra asked, lifting the cocoa to her nose. “Shit, was that  _you_  back at that ski lodge? You  _did_  kill the owners, didn’t you?”

Widowmaker, leaning back on one elbow at her colleague’s side, offered Sombra the most cryptic smile she could muster before hiding it behind the rim of her own mug. Of course she hadn’t, but Sombra’s lingering suspicion never ceased to be amusing. Still, watching the hacker over the top of her drink, she could discern her lingering frustration in her hunched posture and adamant refusal of eye contact.

“You are upset,” Widowmaker observed.

“ _Es obvio_ ,” Sombra said.

“Because I ignored you.”

Sombra turned her full attention to her colleague, brows knit as if trying to read something beyond Widowmaker’s impassive gaze. Clearly unable to find what she was looking for, she simply sighed.

“I wanted to spend time with you,  _araña_. Dancing, gardening - whatever; I did it to be near you. So, yeah, because you ignored me. Man, did they shut off your ability to pick up on context clues, too?”

Widowmaker frowned.

“I thought it was because you were just bad at gardening,” she admitted - and it was true. Sombra’s frustration started in tandem with their work and only worsened with time. She never considered the spy’s participation in a task in which she was clearly uninterested as anything other than an inversion of their usual dynamic; now, Widowmaker realized that was never the case to begin with and that she was, to her continued chagrin, always two steps behind in the strange dance they’d been practicing for over a month now.

“ _Désolée_ ,” she said quietly. “I enjoy spending time with you, too. This is difficult, you understand?”

The hacker tilted her head. “How so?”

“Sometimes, I can put two and two together - context clues,” Widowmaker explained, the slowness of her speech underscoring the care with which she chose the words to best convey her own frustration with Talon’s programming. “Others, it’s as if the two and two are suddenly, I don’t know.  _Trigonométrie_. The math is not so simple. I’m sorry.”

Sombra shifted beneath her blanket, fumbling for its edges as she offered the taller woman an opening. Widowmaker sat up long enough to fit herself neatly against the other woman’s side, slipping an arm about her shoulders before the hacker folded the blanket over the both of them.

“It’s not that cold,” the sniper whispered against her shoulder.

“Do not,” Sombra countered, smiling.


End file.
